Billericay Town ambition making headlines well above non-league level

It was the international break this weekend, meaning no action in the Premier League and the Championship, but many clubs below the Football League also found their league campaigns interrupted. Saturday saw the FA Cup first qualifying round played and BBC cameras were in attendance to stream games live online, with the pick of the action coming from the AGP Arena, the home of Billericay Town of the Isthmian League Premier Division.

Ricay, as they are known, beat Didcot Town 5-0 but they have regularly been making headlines since their takeover by the controversial Glenn Tamplin in December. Tamplin bought a 99 percent stake in the side for 120,000 pounds ($155,000) just a month after pulling out of a deal to purchase fellow Essex nonleaguers Dagenham & Redbridge of the National League, and he has wasted no time in putting his stamp on everything at the club.

He installed himself as manager after the previous one left citing “broken promises” and has pumped cash into the club on both a state-of-the-art, disabled friendly stadium and on player wages to the tune of at least 20,000 pounds per week. Most notably he has been spending them on former Premier League players Jamie O’Hara, Paul Konchesky and Jermaine Pennant.

That’s not the only reason the club have garnered a lot of attention from the national and international press. A video of the team singing R Kelly’s “The World’s Greatest” in the changing rooms ahead of their league cup final last season, complete with the managerowner bellowing “shut your eyes” at his players, went viral.

They won that game but were mocked by their opponents in the next league game. Leatherhead won 3-2 and made a video of the team singing along to the R Kelly hit in the aftermath of their win. Tamplin himself is not shy on social media and stands up for his actions, whether they are R Kelly singalongs, or painting murals of lions in the tunnel to inspire the players, or first hiring cheerleaders to rouse the swelling crowds or quickly sacking them because they had been distracting (and in some cases texting) his players.

He’s clearly a savvy businessman as his bank balance would attest and a savvy marketer to boot. This week’s FA Cup win was the debut of Jeremy Lynch, better known as Jez of the popular YouTube channel F2 Freestylers, but it appears he also knows a thing or two about soccer management – Lynch won a penalty.

Billericay Town are also top of their league since Monday last week when they won 5-0 against Thurrock. Tamplin responded by leading the crowd in an ironic chant of “what a waste of money.” It will cost him a lot more than the 2 million pounds he has already spent to achieve his goal of the Premier League and being the new Bournemouth.

First there’s the small matter of getting to the Football League but Tamplin won’t wait; he expects to be in League Two in five years. Either way, it won’t be dull.